Killer-Diller
by Wish Porter
Summary: It started one rainy night when Darcy was watching Dancing with the Stars. Steve had wandered in and decided to make a comment, "Say, she's a real ducky shincracker." Oneshot


Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

I haven't actually lived in the mentioned time period, so most of it is speculation and creative imagination.

I also used the comics version of Black Widow's history. She's not supposed to be young like they said in the Winter Soldier.

The story takes place not long after the Avengers movie.

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><p>In the last few months, Darcy had come to appreciate her life a little more with the whole Thor thing and then the whole Loki thing… And yeah. Last month especially.<p>

Dr. Jane Foster had been offered a place at Stark Tower. Along with her research assistant.

To anyone who knew anything about anything, it went without saying that Stark Tower doubled as Avengers headquarters.

Darcy knew things.

She also now lived in Avengers Tower, as she referred to it.

Indeed, life was great. The most luxurious of lifestyles, an AI butler in Jarvis, and Tony Stark was footing the bill.

Speaking of Tony Stark, the Avengers were pretty hot.

Tony himself was a billionaire, philanthropist, and playboy extraordinaire, blah blah blah. He also happened to be Ironman. And he owned Stark Industries. For such a young guy, Tony had a lot going for him. Darcy enjoyed his sarcastic wit and she definitely enjoyed his roguish good looks. She even liked his girlfriend, Pepper.

Clint was best known by his codename, Hawkeye. Darcy wasn't sure if he had a normal job or even if he did anything outside of the Avengers Initiative. He must have though, the Avengers wasn't always a thing. Maybe he'd belonged to another superhero team, or maybe he was an assassin, who knows? The man was funny, if brutally honest and blunt. But he had Natasha to cover his ass for him.

Natasha Romanoff was her current identity. She was aware that the woman was a superspy, was super old, had about a million secret identities and twice as many secrets. She was currently SHIELD's primary form of counter-intelligence, specializing in seduction and assassination, known worldwide as the Black Widow. The woman was scary.

There was Bruce, of course. Also scary, as the man had the ability to turn into a giant rage filled monster when he was angry. Dr. Banner himself wasn't exactly fond of the ability so he spent most of his time holed up in laboratories searching for a cure to his affliction. These labs tended to be in remote locations where he wouldn't hurt somebody if something went wrong. Well, before he struck up a friendship with Tony Stark. Now he researched from the safety and isolation of the tower.

Then there was Thor, Jane's boyfriend, the Norse God of Thunder. He was brash and rude, though he was much more polite than he used to be, and had no idea how Earth worked. He still insisted on calling it Midgard and speaking in Asgardian fashion. Darcy liked to look at him but she left his conversational abilities in Jane's capable hands.

And then there was Captain Steve Rogers. Darcy had grown up reading Captain America, like a lot of American kids do. She, unlike most, happened to know the esteemed soldier on a personal level. They said hello to each other every morning over coffee. Steve was approachable, he was young, he was kind and good looking and Darcy may have a slight crush.

They'd started talking more lately and Darcy realized that sometimes, Steve said some pretty strange stuff.

She hadn't asked him about it until one rainy night, he walked into the living room while she was curled up watching Dancing With the Stars. She was curled up on the couch in a comfy sweater and shorts and her hair piled on the top of her head when he walked in. He was focused on the screen as he walked over to stand next to the couch. "Say, she's a real ducky shincracker."

Darcy tore her eyes away from Cheryl's dancing and looked up at the man. He stood with his hands in his pockets looking like he'd just said something completely normal. "What?"

He gave her a quick glance. "Oh, um, that woman; she's a good dancer."

Darcy's eyebrows were in her hair. "Then why didn't you just say that?"

Strong shoulders were bowed in an embarrassed shrug. "It's just something we said in the forties." He made to walk away.

"Wait!" She made room on the couch for him and patted the cushion next to her. "You really talked like that? What else did you say?"

Steve threw his brown leather jacket over the back of the couch and sat down next to her. Her bare calves were pressed against his side, only covered by a tight white t-shirt. "I don't know, we said a lot of things. Some are still said today though."

"Like?"

He thought for a moment. "Above my pay grade. It meant don't ask me. If you asked me what new improvements Tony was making to his suit, I'd say that's above my pay grade. Oh, and beat. If I'm beat, it means I'm tired."

"Are there many words that we still use that you used back in the day?"

Steve grinned at her at the 'back in the day' comment. "A few. I've heard someone say they blew a couple hundred bucks. A kid said he was gonna get chewed out by his mom. A few guys joked about a knuckle sandwich, some teenage girl said natch but she also said perf and that she couldn't even. What does that mean?"

She couldn't help but laugh at him. "It means she's surprised or that she's overwhelmed. Teenage girls say it a lot."

"Oh." He frowned. "We said hot dog as an expression of surprise."

Darcy muted the show. "What about girls, what did you call them?"

"Depends on the girl." He frowned. "A dame was generally a pretty girl. We said it to flatter them, I guess. I was never good with dames. A broad was a really offensive term and was to be used with other men and never said to a woman. Bucky used to use 'dish' for pretty girls he dated. He was doll dizzy, always making a pass at a girl. I think the first girl he dated was the block share crop." He saw her confused look. "That's a promiscuous girl. Generally we called our ladies doll, baby doll, dollface, and I've heard sugar too."

Darcy thought it was all extremely interesting. How often do you get the chance to ask someone about the language of the past who was actually there?

"You know, Cap, you kind of have a strange accent. It's like…I don't know, the Kennedy Address or something."

"I watched that! On the internet. He seemed like a great president. As for the accent," He shrugged. "We just spoke differently back then."

Darcy nodded. There was silence for a moment. "So, what else did you say in the forties?"

Steve grinned at her. "If someone was trouble, they were bad news. Business was abbreviated to biz, chrome-dome was an offensive way to address a bald man. I'm not sure what you want to hear."

"What about guys, were there specific words they said, or were called?"

"I guess so. If someone lost their temper, we'd say they blew a fuse. Women never said that. Bucky came back from a date one day and said the girl was a real cold fish; even I was shocked he said it."

She could guess what a cold fish was quite easily.

"No girl ever said knuckle sandwich, now that I think about it, or applesauce – which was a swear word – horsefeathers, which was another one." He thought for a minute on the past. "Women were different than they are today. If there was a really good-looking guy around, they'd refer to him as a dreamboat. If there was a guy that didn't meet their standards, he was a dud. I remember there was a woman in a rhubarb with her man in the park one day, she called him a fat-head that liked to grandstand and that all he did was flap his lips." He chuckled. "It was a real gas." He saw her confused look and thought on what he'd said. "A rhubarb is an argument. A fathead is a stupid person, like any silly insult really. Grandstand is fairly obvious, and flapping your lips meant that you just talked about yourself all the time and didn't really care about the other person. I don't know if you still use gas but it's a good time or something funny."

Darcy now had her arms around her knees as she rested her cheek on the back of the couch. She loved listening to him talk. He had such a nice voice. And that accent…she wished people still sounded like that. "What about dating?"

"Well just like Bucky was doll dizzy, some girls were khaki wacky. They weren't exactly the type to bring home to meet your folks. With the Depression, it became popular to ask girls if they were rationed instead of asking if they were available. Little things like that made it seem like it wasn't so bad sometimes. If we were really serious after a date or three, we'd go to the girl's house and ask her father's permission to date his daughter. Neither me nor Bucky was ever that serious."

Darcy hummed in acknowledgement of the words.

They watched the still-muted show for a couple minutes until a football player started dancing.

Steve winced. "What a dead hoofer, I bet Thor could do better."

Darcy couldn't help but giggle at the man. "I'm going to assume that a dead hoofer is a bad dancer."

The super soldier nodded with a laugh. "Indeed it does."

She hesitated before just saying it. "It was cool hearing all those words. I think I learned more about the culture of the forties than I ever learned in history class." She smiled at him and got a smile back.

"Killer-diller, dollface." He got up and headed toward the kitchen.

"Hey, what does that one mean?"

"Figure it out."

She thought about it but has no idea what 'killer-diller- could mean. She focused on the other part of the sentence. Dollface. Steve's face from earlier in the conversation popped into her head. She could remember exactly what he'd said. 'We called our ladies doll, baby doll, dollface…' Did that imply interest in her or was she reading too much into it?

She decided to risk it. She called out to him. "Steve!"

There was a slight pause. "Yeah?"

"I'm not rationed."

She could tell from his warm tone that he'd been pleased with her response. "Killer-diller."

She decided that killer-diller was a good thing.

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><p>Killer-diller means good stuff, for anyone who was wondering.<p>

Another drabble done!


End file.
